


Perfect Color Me

by fresne



Category: Bourne Identity series (movie)
Genre: Cat1, Gen, Yuletide, challenge:New Year Resolutions, recipient:Isilya
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-05-31
Updated: 2005-05-31
Packaged: 2017-10-09 20:19:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/91196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresne/pseuds/fresne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He liked to watch the way she moves, turning the pages of his file, her back to the wide, wide windows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perfect Color Me

**Author's Note:**

> The following inspiration for this work and inspiration for my dialogue, where I am not directly quoting, because apt quotes are cool:  
> Extreme Ways by Moby

He likes to watch the way she moves. The way she taps the smooth plastic of her pen against her lips as she thinks. The way she stares blind at the distant rush of cars below. The way she flips her hair as she turns back to her file. Turning her back to her wide windows and the world.

It's not about sex. It's just that she told him his name, like Dr. Moreau naming his animals in some late night movie.

She's looking at his file. Jason's file. David's file. He catches a glimpse of his face in a photo as she turns the pages, one by one.

She's started looking for him again, whoever he is.

He moves the scope in a steady pattern up and away from her window where she sits with her back to the glass. Slow and easy.

She's locking his file away and getting ready to leave. It's 6 o'clock and men in dull suits and women with shiny hair have been flooding out of her building since 5.

He puts down his scope and begins to take apart his rife. Quick and sure. He has ten minutes. The elevators in her building are always busy this time of day.

He puts the broken parts of the rife in a battered brown box. He snaps it shut and heads down the stairs.

He stands in the doorway of his building and watches her join the stream of dull suits and shiny hair down into the subway. She always gets on the same subway car, the second one from the front. It'll be the closest to the exit when the train arrives at her station.

He wants to call her. Tell her take a different train once and awhile.

But he doesn't. He just follows her down into the subway.

If Marie were alive she'd tell him to stop this shite. If Marie were alive, she'd look at him with angry mermaid eyes, wet from the sea. If Marie were alive.

But she's not.

He gets in the front car and holds a plastic loop with a tight hand. Stands with the clustering commuters and waits as the tunnels spark by.

He doesn't watch her. He doesn't need to. She always stands in the middle of the car. There's a better chance of getting a seat in the middle, as commuters melt away.

A man says, "Is that your box?"

"Yes," he says and he moves the box between his legs. He stands in the first car and holds the plastic loop in a tight hand.

He can smell the man behind him sweat Old Leather in his soft brown suit. He can feel the heat of the woman next to him in her hard plastic coat. He can hear the beep of the stockbroker playing pong, the giggle of the lab tech sending text messages, the roar of the train rattling on its way.

He watches the clean shaven man in the Dead t-shirt, who sits in the same seat every day. He watches the nurse who always leans up against the door between cars.

He watches and waits until her train pulls into her station.

He gets off the train before she can fight her way to the door. He's down the stairs before she can pull her ticket from her wallet where she always keeps it. He watches her walk down her street where she walks the same way every day to her apartment.

He wants to call her to tell her to vary her route once and awhile.

But he doesn't.

Instead he watches her walk down her every day street.

She goes into her lobby and disappears. He sits in his spot and waits. Watches the homeless Vietnam-Vet-God-Bless, who always sits on the same corner this time of day. Watches the evening turn into night.

He closes his eyes and he dreams something splintered. Like a frozen pumpkin dropped from the top of a building.

He blinks eyes to fracture the night until it is day.

He likes to watch her get ready in the morning. She thinks that the blinds shield her. They only fracture his view as she stretches through the morning routine. He likes the way she pours her coffee and inhales. He likes the way she runs on her treadmill, like it means something. He likes the way she peers out her blinds at the new day before she heads for the door.

He starts walking ahead of her.

She stops at the same bakery every morning and gets a bagel. Plain. Toasted. Low fat cream cheese. She's too thin already. Tired. Worn.

He wants to say something.

But he doesn't.

He gets on the first last car of the train. She always gets on the second to last car, because it's the one that will let her out right next to the escalator into the world.

He doesn't follow her into her building. There are guards in her lobby. She walks through a metal detector every morning. Shows her badge to the guard who knows her name. Takes the elevator up to her office where she sits with her back to the window.

He walks around the building. Down the stairs to the little covered plaza where the smokers huddle their hands around their last smoke before they go in. He bums a smoke that he doesn't inhale. He clips his temp badge to his shirt and doesn't smoke his cigarette and lets their talk wash over him. And as they go in, he follows them past the sign that warns against piggybacking. He has a badge, it just doesn't work.

It doesn't really need to.

He walks past the server room door and up the stairs. He has a pad of paper and a pen. He has a box that must be full of tools. He walks briskly. People with pads of paper and pens belong places. They walk like they know where they're going and he does.

He walks past the cubes and the computers and the people who belong. He walks into the empty office. The one above hers. He puts down his pad and his pen and his box. He sits behind the desk and he pulls out his scope.

He looks up and around. Slow and easy. On the roof of the office building that he was in yesterday, there is a man in a dull blue coat with a scope watching her window.

Somewhere below in an office, she sits too close to the window. Turns and gazes sightless out as she considers whether to keep looking for Jason Bourne. David Webb. Whoever that is.

It seems that Jason isn't the only one interested in knowing if she will.

He should call her. Tell her take a different train once and awhile. To not sit so close to the windows. To tighten her blinds.

But he doesn't.

It's not about sex.

He just likes the way she moves. And he wants to know who is left to care that she is looking for Jason Bourne. David Webb. So, he watches the man watching her and he waits.

**Author's Note:**

> If after reading my fiction here, you would like to read more about me and my writing check out my profile.


End file.
